Paleo Ice Cream with Thai Inspirations

I recently took a trip to Thailand where inspiration for flavors and adventures are around each and every corner and usually in unexpected places. The more I explored, the further I travelled, I became pleasantly lost in a country of spices, flavors, curiosities and wonderfully warm people. I took a cooking class from Thai Charm Cooking School, ate homemade spiced chicken and rice on remote islands with Phi Phi Dive Club, bartered for Spices with Joy at the Damnoen Floating Market, drank ginger rum with a french man who made the best American burgers, ate “Angry Birds” sushi, dined at the finest of street food stalls for $3.00 a meal, perused local farmers markets for local fruits and fried whole chickens, and downed my weight in Pad Thai. The flavors and adventures plus birthday present in the form of an ice cream maker inspired me to make “Thai” Ice Cream once I returned home.

Thai Spices from the Floating Markets

Simple ingredients for Rum Ginger ice cream

Here are the recipes for my Paleo ice cream. Most use a base of Coconut Whole Fat Milk, which you can find in the Asian section of a grocery store and Coconut Creme, which you can find at an Asian specialty stores, Trader Joe’s, or Amazon. Because Amazon has everything. Except Angry Birds sushi.

Ginger Rum Paleo Ice Cream

Ingredients for Ginger Rum ice cream

This Ginger Rum ice cream was inspired by a French man, living in Thailand, who served the most amazing American Meals. I spent my birthday evening there, where we celebrated with newfound friends with burgers, cigars, and the most delicious ginger-infused rum. The rum was made by adding ginger slices and sugar to a bottle of rum and patiently turning the rum bottle on its side for 6 months at a time. Fortunately, this Ice Cream can be made in about 3-4 hours and requires much less patience than ginger rum. Before you start, remember to put your ice cream bowl from your ice cream maker or Kitchen Aid attachment in the freezer overnight to fully freeze!Ingredients
1c Rum (yes, this much – you’re going to burn it off)
2c full fat coconut milk
1/2 inch ginger root, cut into small slices
2 tsp salt
1/2c brown sugar
1 tbs vanilla extract

In a small sauce pan over medium high heat, bring rum to a boil. Reduce to simmer and let sit until the alcohol burns off. You’ll know the alcohol is burned off when you take a deep sniff and your nose does NOT have that “omg, alcohol!” reaction. Add all remaining ingredients. Simmer over low heat until the ginger flavor is as strong as you like it. The longer you simmer, the stronger it gets. I simmered about 20 minutes. Remove ginger and cool the ingredients in the refrigerator (overnight) or in the freezer (about 1 hour). If the ingredients aren’t cool, they will NOT set in your ice cream maker.

Mango “Sticky Rice” Ice Cream

Coconut, salt, and mangoes love to hang out together in ice cream!

Mango sticky rice is a popular and incredibly delicious dessert from Thailand. This recipe is not Paleo, because condensed & evaporated milk are used in several Thai dishes. In fact, they like these ingredients so much that they are sold in little stands on the side of the road. This recipe uses condensed milk, and it’s worth cheating on any diet for it!

Peel the mangoes, chop and puree until corse. Add all ingredients except for the raw coconut flakes into a saucepan over medium-low heat. Let simmer for about 5-10 minutes until all flavors meld. At this point, you can adjust salt and sugar to taste. Cool the ingredients in the refrigerator (overnight) or in the freezer (about 1 hour). If the ingredients aren’t cool, they will NOT set in your ice cream maker.

While ice cream base is cooling, toast raw coconut flakes in a 350 degree oven for 5-10 minutes until slightly brown. WATCH the coconut carefully. It goes from brown to black in an instant. I know this because I did this. First batch thrown out, second batch watched much more closely!

Perfectly toasted (not burned!) coconut flakes

Using your ice cream maker instructions, churn the ingredients until delicious, frozen, and creamy. Top with toasted coconut flakes.

Irish Coffee Paleo Ice Cream

Ingredients for Irish Coffee paleo ice cream

Irish Coffees are not what you’d think of when you think of Thailand. But it reminds me of an evening watching World Cup games at midnight at an Irish Bar, who claimed to serve the best Irish Coffees in all of Thailand. I’m not sure the competition was stiff for this challenge, but I am sure that the Irish Coffees were delicious and left a warm memory from Thailand.

In a small sauce pan over medium high heat, bring whiskey to a boil. Reduce to simmer and let sit until the alcohol burns off. You’ll know the alcohol is burned off when you take a deep sniff and your nose does NOT have that “omg, alcohol!” reaction. Add all remaining ingredients. Simmer over low heat until the coffee flavor is as strong as you like it. The longer you simmer, the stronger it gets. I simmered about 20 minutes. At this point, you can adjust salt and sugar. Strain the mixture through cheesecloth to remove coffee grounds as they can become bitter. Cool the ingredients in the refrigerator (overnight) or in the freezer (about 1 hour). If the ingredients aren’t cool, they will NOT set in your ice cream maker.

Hi Aunti Wen! I used the Cuisine Art Ice Cream maker. It’s amazing and William’s Sonoma often has it on sale. For my next posting, I’m showing blackberry ice cream and noting everything I’ve learned about ice cream making so far. Stay tuned! Oh, and next time of course I’ll take you!

Past Yummy Posts

MarinaGirlEats on Instagram

A little about me

I live in the beautiful city of San Francisco where food, ingredients, and creativity reigns supreme. Oh, and so does wine. And whiskey. While I work in finance on the weekdays, I spend my weekends and evenings obsessing over food, recipes, and photography. And wine and whiskey.
My food blog, www.MarinaGirlEats.com is a compilation of my recipes I've created over the years, the 411 on technical skills I've learned, and recipes from whatever Farmer's Market fresh food inspirations I've found that week. And although I'm a paleo practicioner, I promise not to push that crazy diet on you because (a) I love making everything from bread to cheese and (b) a blog of fish and spinach is sooooo booring.
Please visit my site www.MarinaGirlEats.com and sign up to follow so I can send you shameless posts/tweets/facebook requests on anything from perfect mashed potatoes to making your own butter.
XOXO, Erica